“When I close my eyes, I can see Baghdad’s streets,” Nahida al-Rammah, one of Iraq’s famous actresses, wept in a documentary interview for one of the post-war organizations, The Iraq Memory Foundation. Narrating how she was chased and tortured by the former regime’s dictatorship, she made me nailed to the feet in front of her heart-breaking image exposed on a wide hp computer monitor. With the sound of the lute playing through the computer speakers, I felt her tears were dancing sadly with the rhythm.
In the fortified blast-walled Green Zone, the foundation held its largest cultural and artistic exhibition on the third anniversary of the fall of Saddam’s dictator regime. As Rammah continued narrating her miserable life under the former dictatorship, 24 Steps to Liberty and I were gazing sadly. Our eyes were filled with tears strong enough not to fall down. Suddenly, 24 left the room. I followed leaving our American colleague, whom we accompanied, watching the interview. What we were watching was enough to remind us with how tough old days were. I couldn’t continue following him. He needed to be alone. He needed to smoke and compensate himself by himself.
Founded in 2003, the Iraq Memory Foundation expands on work begun by scholar and author, Kanaan Makkiya, in 1992 to preserve and analyze Iraqi ex-regime’s crimes. Makiyya’s foundation chose this day, Saddam’s fall anniversary, to expose its work through this gallery.
As 24, American friend, and I were walking in one of the halls, the paintings of some of the most famous artists were shining. They were talking as if their colors were penetrating the silence of the world.
“If you get the chance to buy one painting, which one would you choose,” our American colleague asked. I pointed out to the one with the brown house with wooden Shanasheel [balcony]. This painting reminded me with my Baghdad that I miss a lot. It showed how simple and beautiful it looked like with the Iraqi woman and her tunga. It reminded me with how beautiful life was back in the 1950s and 60s. How he, his friends and family lived peacefully. Another painting drew my attention, an image of doves in front of wolves trying to eat them.
The paintings, the sculptures, and the other documentary things were not the only things that brought tears to our eyes. The fact that these things had to be exposed in a gallery inside the Green Zone was an enough sign to remind us with the present time. Time when the elected politicians fight for positions while the people are being killed by hundreds of thousands. Such a huge cultural exhibition was opened to be seen by Iraqi and American officials only. No citizen fond of art was invited. My heart sank when I thought of my friends and relatives who were unable to see such a nice work. They were waiting for it. It came but there is no way they go and see it.
Flipping through the foundation’s booklet we were given made me more sad when I realized that people will not be able to enjoy their new projects as they will be established inside the Green Zone. The foundation was granted the right to use the Ceremonial Parade Grounds, where the two huge crossing swords lie, as a land for establishing a museum, memorial and a center of culture and scholarship.
Everybody knows that the security situation is going from bad to worse day after day, but this never prevented cultural activities from taking place outside the government’s and the American’s heaven, the Green Zone. Iraq’s first Children’s Culture Theater Festival has started in the Red Zone where the millions, not few thousands, live. It has not been attacked since it started. So why doesn’t this exhibition shed the light on a dark age among people, not away from them?!
For Dr. Makiyya and all the team working hard in Washington D.C. and Baghdad’s Green Zone, I say thank you for all the hard work you did and still doing but all Iraqis will be more happy to see your foundation become among them as it came from them and from all the suffering they went through.
